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Friday, 30 December 2016

Things Go Wrong

I'm making a push to finish Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness so I can say I read a classic novel in '16, in conformance with my New Years resolution of 15 or so years ago. (MarkB and several others recommended that I pick a short book and try to cram for 2016. I'm game.) Kindle says I'm 34% finished, so I have some reading to do today.

The Kindle e-book I downloaded cost nothing, like many classic texts in the public domain. There were a number of choices. I downloaded one that said it was "Illustrated."

It also said it came with a "Free Audiobook." I wasn't able to manage the convoluted series of steps and signups and downloads it would have taken to extract the allegedly free audiobook from the tubes of the internets, but it doesn't matter because apparently the audiobook was an "abridged" version. I always liked that word; I visualize readers bypassing the ravines and chasms of the boring parts of books with the aid of bridges. But abridged...really? Heart of Darkness is a novella, barely longer than a long short story. Faulkner wrote sentences that were longer.

Okay, he didn't really.

And the Kindle book is "illustrated," all right...with JPEGs of what look to be Frederic Remington paintings of American Wild West scenes. (Heart of Darkness is about colonialism in Africa.) They're illustrations, all right—generically, anyway—but they have zero to do with the book. I read almost nothing but e-books these days, but e-books, it must be said, still have quite a bit of evolving left to do. There is a great deal to be said for printed books, which are highly evolved and sometimes rise to the level, even, of art. I'd love to know the process by which these particular illustrations got added to this particular book file. How did that whole process break down so badly?

But what can you say? Things go wrong.

Serviceable planThings go wrong, all right. Sometimes I feel like I'm barely keeping up with entropy. My four-and-a-half-year-old washing machine has broken down, and will cost more than half the price of a new one to fix. (Its motherboard went bad. Are you getting that? My washing machine has a motherboard.) It's been broken for two weeks; the part has arrived—the new motherboard—but my next service appointment is on January third.

And not only that, but at the same time, my water heater, which also dates from 2012, went kerplooie and needs to be replaced altogether. You're getting the part about four and a half years, right? Fortunately, the water heater, unlike the washing machine, is still under warranty, so it will be replaced for only a $50 upcharge. (The upcharge is because they don't make 52-gallon tanks any more; the new ones are 50-gallon tanks. A direct replacement would have been free, but they can't make a direct replacement. Another way of looking at that is that it's $25 to me per gallon of diminished capacity, but let's try not to look at it like that.) Counting the plumber's labor charges, I might get out from under that one for less than $300 if I'm lucky. But in the meantime, I haven't been able to wash clothes or sheets for two weeks, and now I can't take a shower or run the dishwasher either. Looks like my little annus horribilis (Latin for "lousy year") is ending with a few little twists of the knife, just to put a cap on things. One last little flourish.

A pox on planned obsolescence. The washing machine vendor wants me to buy an "extended warranty"...for $49 a month. Yes, it would cover all my appliances, but fer Pete's sake. Who do they think they are, Adobe?

You have to put things in perspective, though. A photographer friend who lives in New York City had a gas leak, and the repair has to be approved by City inspectors before his gas can be turned back on...and City inspectors are working on a two-week backlog. So my friend's gas leak is fixed, but he doesn't have heat or hot water until the inspectors get around to him. He says he's taking it one day at a time.

All I have to do is sit at the launderette reading Joseph Conrad illustrated with cowboys and Indians on horseback. Could be worse.

It's almost as if business in general is morphing quietly into an art of gentle, legal extortion. I almost hesitate to mention this, for fear of creating a jinx, but I really hope camera manufacturers aren't sitting around large tables this very minute plotting ways to extract more cash from us with manipulative schemes involving planned obsolescence, extended warranties, service plans, and monthly service fees. Because, really, it's bad enough that I buy a new camera every three years when there's nothing wrong with the old one; but, let's admit, it could be worse.

My e-book copy of Heart of Darkness. It's illustrated!! What a bonus.

The White Whale...and the White DogThis post should end right there, but, speaking of reading plans, listen to what I did yesterday: I found a serviceable free e-text of Moby-Dick (did you know the actual title includes the hyphen? True) on Kindle-for-the-Cloud, or whatever it's called, and also sampled more than a dozen audiobooks of Moby-Dick on iTunes. I downloaded an audiobook version narrated by a voice actor called Anthony Heald (this process took an hour and a call to Applecare tech support, and the tech support guy was flummoxed too at first, and proud of himself when he finally figured out what had gone wrong—did I mention that things go wrong?). So I've set myself up so that I can display the text of Moby-Dick writ large on my 27" screen, while at the same time listening to Anthony reading it to me. It's quite nice.

Things do go right sometimes. For example, I needed a new rug for the living room, and for half a year I had my eye on one I liked that was too expensive for me. Finally it disappeared from the website—sold out. Rats. Lost my chance.

But then I got a big idea, and did a reverse image search on the catalogue picture. I found the same rug at Overstock for almost but not quite half price! And it was the last one they had! I ordered it, feeling smug, like you feel when you score what you think is a bargain.

Trouble is, the rug they sent looked quite a bit different from the JPEG in the catalog. Not just a different color; it had different design elements, too. So after another hour or so with Customer Service, Overstock agreed to send a UPS call tag for it, pay return shipping, and give me a refund.

So far so good, right? Well, then Butters threw up on the rug. Twice.

So of course I couldn't in good conscience return it after that (even though it cleaned up nicely), so I had to call off UPS and cancel the return.

So what's good about this story? Well...the plumber liked the rug.

So there's that.

By the way, the two most famous printed editions of Moby-Dick (besides the first) are the three-volume Lakeside Press Edition of 1930, with illustrations by Rockwell Kent, limited to 1,000 copies; and the splendid Arion Press Edition of 1979, with illustrations by Barry Moser, limited to 265 copies. I believe, although I am not certain, that each is considered the masterpiece of their respective illustrators. But both are unquestionably masterpieces of bookmaking and highly prized, and command prices of many thousands of dollars when they are available at all (my ambition would be just to lay eyes on them, once). Both have been reproduced in diminished trade versions that reproduce the masterful typography and illustrations. Even the Folio Society edition with the Kent illustrations is getting up towards a grand now. At least the illustrations in both these cases actually relate to the text.

So I have plans to finish Moby-Dick in 2017. Isn't it fitting that the book about the White Whale is the metaphorical white whale of my minimalist novel-reading program? Voyaging to the bitter end with Mr. Heald in my ear is definitely one of my resolutions for the coming year.

I shall end here with that. Please check back next year at this time, to see how I did.

Mike(Thanks for all the swell book recommendations yesterday.You got me enthused and energized.)

P.S. By a wonderful coincidence, Nathaniel Philbrick, who wrote a popular nonfiction book about the only real-life sinking of a whale ship by a whale (it was called In the Heart of the Sea), has a sort-of new book out called Why Read Moby-Dick? Maybe my timing is okay after all.

P.P.S. Longtime readers will recall my former epic obsession with "The Great White Squirrel." (I see I've repeated myself somewhat in recent days, but oh, well.) I never did get a good photograph of the white squirrel. Wildlife photography, it turns out, is hard.

Original contents copyright 2016 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)Featured Comments from:

Geoff Wittig: "I own three books from Andrew Hoyem's Arion Press, the best being his lovely Shakespeare's Sonnets, but can only dream about his Moby-Dick. Hoyem's books over time have tended toward more modernist literature rather than hoary classics, so there'll never be anything like it again. I was fortunate enough to stumble across a copy of the limited edition University of California Press slip-cased facsimile of Hoyem's Moby-Dick at a used bookstore in Rochester. I think I paid $150 for it, which my wife thought insane. But it now goes for $1,250–$1,650, so I tried to persuade her that it was a good purchase. Her reply: 'That just proves all you book collectors are insane.'"

Mike adds: Speaking of that insanity, Geoff knows, but maybe some others do not, that Nicholas Basbanes' great classic about book collecting is called A Gentle Madness. It's a great nonfiction read if you like books, a comprehensive window into the world of rare books and collecting, which has a rich lore and a vivid history. Warmly recommended.

Here are a few photos of the UC Press facsimile Geoff mentions, probably the most desirable edition of M-D for ordinary people to aspire to, provided by Mike Plews, who also owns a copy:

Bob Keefer: "Anthony Heald is a veteran actor at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, in the small southern Oregon town of Ashland—which is kind of a world capitol for audiobook narrators, since so many very good actors live there. So no surprise you picked his version. He was, if I recall, Eliza's father a couple years ago in a great production of 'My Fair Lady.'"

Jarle Vikshåland: "Regarding Moby Dick—check out the Moby Dick Big Read—each chapter read by a diffrent person. Tilda Swindon reads Chapter One, and one of my absolute favorites—Chapter Nine, 'The Sermon,' is read by Simon Callow—it's just over 20 minutes long and has Jonah and the whale as its theme. Each chapter is illustrated by a different artist. Well worth a listen."

Peter Conway: "I sympathize with you. My four-month-old Sony alarm clock went off, as requested, at 7 a.m. this morning. I hit the snooze button, as usual, but the alarm didn't snooze. Tried again, with no luck. I hit the button to turn off the alarm, but it kept going. I unplugged it from the wall, but—wait for it—it kept going, thanks to battery backup. Flipped it over to remove the battery, but it requires a Phillips-head screw driver to open, and I don't happen to sleep with one nearby.

"By this time the dogs were looking mighty agitated, so I stumbled down two flights of stairs to the basement, tossed the clock into a room, shut the door, and went to start my day. On the one hand, the alarm certainly did its job—I was WIDE awake—but the user experience left a lot to be desired."

Alan Farthing: "Mike I said, in response to another article, that I hike several days a week. Today was meant to be one such day. However I shall be 'enjoying' the day repairing our washing machine instead. So yes I really do feel your pain!"

Thomas Paul McCann (partial comment): "Re planned obsolescence, I seem to recall Ralph Nader in Unsafe at Any Speed saying that General Motors calculated that the average mileage of their new cars before replacement was in the region of 30,000 miles. Not giving a fig about the secondhand buyer, they downgraded certain parts that were lasting way beyond 30,000 miles to save money."

Mike replies: I understand the principle, but what's the benefit to washing machine manufacturers of having the machines break down right at the holidays? Alan and I have better things to do, like hiking and reading Heart of Darkness.

(Just kidding.)

I remember reading in the '70s or '80s that Porsche developed a prototype of a "20-year car"—an automobile designed from the start for a 20-year service life. All the parts were overbuilt and understressed, all the known problem spots addressed. The bean counters, of course, killed it. The problem was that it would have had incrementally less performance and incrementally more cost (I think something like 20% or 30% in both cases) and the marketers determined that people wouldn't pay for mere longevity if it came with those penalties.

On the other hand, years ago I knew a guy who had a Honda Prelude with 420,000 miles on it. When his car payments ended, he determined to take an amount equaling one-third of his former payments and to devote that amount to annual maintenance—telling the mechanics to do whatever needed doing and replace whatever needed replacing. The car looked quite shabby, but he said he still liked it and it still drove fine. He told me something like, "Now I have to keep it, because I have to find out how much longer I can keep it going."

The opposite of planned obsolescence (one of the few words I have trouble spelling, by the bye, another being "ophthalmology") is the story of M. Allen Swift, who was given a Springfield Rolls-Royce Piccadilly P1 Roadster by his father in 1928 as a graduation present, and drove it until his death at age 102, putting 170,000 miles on it. It's instructive that these days, the value of "luxury" cars tends to plummet quickly, because excessive ongoing maintenance costs overpower their utility as cars quite quickly—in other words, there's lots to go wrong and what does go wrong is dreadfully expensive to fix. These are truly cars built for their first owners only—and thus flagrantly wasteful in a number of ways. At his death Mr. Smith bequeathed $1 million and his Rolls to the Springfield Museums, AKA the Quadrangle, in Springfield, Massachusetts, where I'm told the car is on display today.

Chas: "I hope that this note doesn't count as hubris and bring down the wrath of the gods on my washer and dryer, but as I sit here in my library I can hear, in a distant part of the house, the sound of my 1976 Maytag washer working on part of this week's laundry. The washer and dryer were bought forty years and three months ago. They have both needed some service in that time, but nothing that couldn't be done with a screwdriver and a wrench. Original cost $1,025, cost for parts over the forty years about $300.

"I have a generally low opinion of extended warranties, but if your $49 per month had started in '76 the total cost would have been $24,000. Even if it had been half that it would be far beyond exorbitant. I am not looking forward to the day when our units fail and we have to join the current repair/replace cycle. Happy New Year!"

Mike replies: That's what gets me. I left one of those '70s Maytags, still working fine, in my first Wisconsin house. Somebody should build a replica! This was a solved problem. We had this problem solved with those Maytags and their ilk. We made it into a problem again so that more people could harvest more money off us. Bah.

Comments

I feel your pain. Been there, done that. Washing machines and their brethern dryers are currently deisgned to fail, after five years. Ditto cheap automobiles and can think of one of the third of the once big three auto builders that has recently shortened its name to an Italian company name, their products last maybe five years. Yet for some reasons their basic multi-transport older vans go forever it seems.

And the problem is, your income dependeds upon us the lowly reader of your columns.Mind with our dollar dropping in relation to your dollar, money is notgoing to be forth coming from here for a bit. Like you have "house" related expenses. And as it is the fiscal end of my year, shall be ataching my p's and q's as well.

At least you're not yet snowed in to your abode high on the shores of the lake, yet.

You do have a back-up generator for electricity and extra fuel eh?

And you comment about Adobe as an expensive with-drawer of money on a monthly basis is oh so true.

Trying to remove myself from the Apple clod as we speak, those bastards charge me in US funds and then convert the charges to Canadian funds and nick me the exchange rate charges as well...
Maybe soon, maybe soon...

Mike, what great laughs you provided in this year-end column. "Been there, done that" with "warranties" and breakdowns. I did, however, have to replace a Kenmore washer several years ago that I bought in 1975. Its one replacement was the timer for the various functions. But I don't think they make 'em like that anymore.

I don't remember your Great White Squirrel post -- we have an albino squirrel here in Brooklyn, in Prospect Park, which I stumbled across one day. The squirrels here are more used to human company so I was able to get relatively close and got this shot, which Gothamist posted:

[I sympathize, but I doubt the B&N gift books are real leather. Neither of the two standout editions I mentioned are leather-bound.

Leather cracks and weakens eventually at what's called the "hinge" of a binding; and real leather-bound books require maintenance to last properly. It was a field of great artistry at its peak, especially in England and France, but that peak is long past. Most books now are not even hardbound, much less leather-bound. I've always been more a fan of cloth binding as it's more utilitarian and requires less care. --Mike

P.S. I put in several calls to B&N to see if I could get to the bottom of this...ended up sending an email to the director of corporate PR for the chain. She probably won't respond immediately because of the holiday but if she does, I'll report back.]

I suspect that you 'inherited' the washing machine with your house, but if you purchased it with a credit card, check to see if the warranty is extended as a result; many credit cards have that provision. If not, consider that aspect for your new purchase.

I recently learned about the motherboard aspect on my 8 year old washing machine when the manufacturer issued a recall alert that the machine could catch fire (thanks for telling me 8 years later). I had to wait 2 weeks for the repair part (to the motherboard), and had to decide if I should use the machine in the meantime despite warnings to wait for the repair. Well, all I can say is time goes by quite slowly when you stand near your machine for a full cycle.

I just bought my son, who is in his thirties, "The Spy Who Came In From The Cold" by John le Carre. It's a classic (although not free yet) - the antidote to Bond, a bleak forerunner of todays government expediency and manipulation. And more. An easy read to finish 2016 (240 pages)

We have also had a duff year, domestic flood in February, just settling back in just now. We just had our dishwasher replaced with a faulty motherboard, it was at least 15 years old, possibly 20. I expect the German replacement to last as long.

A little knowledge can sometimes pick up a bargain. When I realised I needed a new battery for my old Pentax K20D, (first sold 2008) I wondered if the same battery was used in anything else. It was, in the Minolta K7D (2005)

2005 being aeons ago in digital camera time, the shop had just one left in stock, marked down to a fiver plus P&P. It works fine.

I know I didn't save much, but I apply this principle to lots of things.

Mike, this planned obsolescence has been creeping in since about 1970. It seems to be getting more difficult to get round now, though.

As former President Bill Clinton often said, "I feel your pain". After two solid days of holiday cooking, my wife and I loaded up our trusty 18 year old dishwasher on Christmas day only to discover the pump had failed. So we washed about three loads by hand that evening. Now for the task of selecting a new dishwasher. Arrghh.

I finished reading Moby-Dick in the wee hours after the election. I could not sleep so I finished the last 1/4 of the book.

I bought my copy at Costco where it was in a blue faux leather cover. It is interesting to reflect that there is really not much of a real story line but a lot on the history, anatomy of whales, details of the ship and details of the various characters.

After "having" to read the book in high school and getting the "Classic Comic Book" version long ago, I thought a re-read would do me good. Then there is the quote in the Star Trek movie "Fist Contact". The female character states that she never read the book after Picard says:

"He piled upon the whale's white hump the sum of all the general rage and hate felt by his whole race from Adam down; and then, as if his chest had been a mortar, he burst his hot heart's shell upon it.”

I'm betting you'll enjoy Ishmael a lot more via audio. I had the same problem with Moby-Dick until I got it as an audiobook that I could listen to while commuting. Ditto Ulysses and a few other works. With Ulysses in particular, the "music" of the language, spoken by a very capable professional reader, conveyed a lot more than the written word,

It's ridiculous that a washing machine has a mother board, but no doubt there's more margin in a mother board equipped machine than in the older electro-mechanical style. Along with your mother board, though, you also get Tin Whiskers. Tin Whiskers are, basically, metal extrusions that grow spontaneously inside electronic components, rendering said components inoperable. They typically start their growth within two to five years of manufacture, and they can't be prevented using current technology. This phenomenon came about as the result of the legally mandated removal of lead in solder, in Europe and North America, circa 2006. (Lead suppresses the growth of Tin Whiskers.)

Heart of Darkness is a great recommendation, and the perfect choice for last minute novel-catching-up. And certainly you can't go wrong with Moby-Dick for next year.

I've tried the business of listening to an audiobook as I read, but almost no voice actor reads aloud with the acuity and nuance I have reading silently - so it's almost always an exercise in disappointment. If I could get my books read to me by Marlon Brando, Anthony Hopkins, or Meryl Streep, it might be different.

I'll also second the suggestion someone made for Philip K Dick. The more dystopian the world gets, the better this recommendation becomes. I have a feeling it's about to become golden in a big hurry.

I still think, though, that you'd enjoy, and maybe benefit by, the trio of Heinlein books I mentioned in my earlier comment.

Best of the new year to you, Mike! - and to all my fellow readers of you.

That reminds me of what a contractor advised me, a specialist on weatherizing homes. When I asked him if I should upgrade my 90's era gas furnace to a more modern, efficient one he said not unless I like replacing motherboards. He was sticking with one just like mine.

I believe that Philbrick book isn't actually new, Mike. I recall reading it a few years ago, and by the way, it's worth it. In it you will discover that much of Moby-Dick is comedy--a real knee-slapper for the 19th-century reader familiar with the whaling culture of the time. Also, you are wise to employ audio. Like Shakespeare, M-D is best if spoken aloud.

Those motherboards for washing machines: It could be a capacitor which has just gone bad that you should try and replace first. It will cost you a couple of dollars. You can google YouTube for these repair videos...

Just a note for you. Planned obsolescence doesn't really exist. Companies don't design things to break after a certain time period.

Everything is designed to a set cost. LED bulbs are an example of this. They can be made to last for 20 years, but this costs more than most people are willing to pay. So the company that makes them decides on a lower cost model. The engineers source parts that cost less. Those parts have lower tolerances and they fail at rates commensurate with their cost. So now LED bulbs only last a few years, but they cost less to buy.

Things in the past weren't necessarily built better, or lasted longer on average. We only see the the examples that have lasted longer than the designers expected. All the other copies with faults or failed parts have been discarded and replaced. If things from the past were all built better, we'd all still be using our grandparents appliances.

I just finished Swann's Way on dailylit.com. They send you a page of your chosen book each day and although it can take a long time to finish a book, I find it helps me get through difficult works. You can always get the next page immediately if you want it. I read Moby Dick the same way, and my advice is to skip the pseudo-science whale stuff. It's not essential to the story.

Our 2007 clothes dryer died a couple of months ago. It took a few days to get an independent repairman in. He made a repair that seemed to fix it, then went on vacation after warning us he wasn't certain it was truly fixed. Sure enough, it failed again. Several days later, the repairman decided it was time to try replacing the control board. He wasn't certain the problem was with the control board, but he grumbled there was no way to tell without swapping it out. It took over two weeks to get the new board, and it didn't fix the problem. At this the repairman gave up and recommended buying a new dryer. Because it was a special order, he charged us for the control board, but because he failed to fix the problem, he refused to charge us for labor. (We would use him again.)

So we drove over to our favorite appliance store and ordered a new dryer, but they were out of stock on the matching base. By the time it arrived and the new dryer was installed, we had been nine weeks without a dryer.

I have the old control board sitting next to me. It is potted in about a sixteenth of an inch of a transparent rubbery substance, which I think would make it difficult to replace a capacitor or other component, assuming you knew which one to replace. It looks like good protection against vibration, however.

As a coincidence when I read peoples book suggestion for the “Heart of Darkness” I remembered that I have a copy lying around that I started late one night when I woke up and could not go back to sleep. I was about half way in when I got pulled away by another book and then another and then forgot about it. I am now determined to finish it, probably not before the New Year but soon afterwards. Is this an affliction of older people (me in my mid 60’s) to forget about a book they are reading? I never used to do this. I will stop reading a book if I am not interested in it but that is a conscious decision.

I also agree with you on some business whose business plan is to nickel and dime us to hit their profit goals. I keep getting emails to sign up for a service plan for our new washer machine. I should never have given Sears my email address.

Did you look on gutenberg.org for the book? I haven't seen any of the abridged nonsense there, but then it may be achore to get it on your reader.

My favorite line in M-D is the last one (not necessarily because the epic is over), and I forgive H.M. for the low estimate at the end.

"Now small fowls flew screaming over the yet yawning gulf; a sullen white surf beat against its steep sides; then all collapsed, and the great shroud of the sea rolled on as it rolled five thousand years ago."

I have actually had a decent year, so earlier this morning when I read this, I was simply going to write a comment concerning Kindle books and also idiotic digital household appliances gone insane. Living in a Japanese apartment, I am an expert on the latter.

But then I went out with my new old Fujifilm X-E1 so that I could then play around looking for creative painterly effects from its wonderful xtrans sensor. After a few hours, I tried to change from my old Oly Zuiko 28mm to one of the quality-built, second-to-none Fuji 35mm f2 lenses.

The Fujichron fell apart in my hands when I tried removing the body cap.

Now it had always been a bit stubborn to remove---thought it was the waterproofing ring on the lens---but this time the lens came apart. In over 35 years of photography, I must admit I have never had a lens of any price or quality fall apart in my hands. Or fall apart at all. Some may think I have a bad copy, but mine is an original, not a copy.

I look at the bright side though, for although I was a slow learner after my X100 experience with stuck aperture blades) and then its screw on 50mm teleconverter with its near uncorrectable distortion, this time I finally got the message about Fuji. The Fujis I have owned and used have not been those unbelievably amazing devices of wonder and perfection of Internet fame. A poor man’s Leica? That idea would justifiably anger both poor men and Leica owners.

The bright side is that 2017 will be better in at least one small way for me. because with global warming hell is unlikely to ever get cold enough for me to purchase another Fujifilm product.

End of New Years Eve rant. Time to go to the kitchen and turn on the hot water for a nice warm bath. I must turn it on from the kitchen because I can't from the bathroom...oh, the idiotic digital appliance story will have to wait until next year.

[I'm pretty sure a Fuji lens falling apart in your hands is not something Fuji would consider normal. You have a reasonable cause for complaint and a warranty replacement or repair would be in order. --Mike]

Planned Obsolence
I seem to recall Ralph Nader in "Unsafe at Any Speed" saying that General Motors calculated that the average mileage of their new cars before replacement was in the region of 30,000 miles. Not giving a fig about the second hand buyer they downgraded certain parts that were lasting way beyond 30,000 miles to save money.
Moby Dick
The film was made in County Kerry and my wife's grandmother, who used to holiday there, was regularly regaled by Gregory Peck in a local bar. " A charming boy" she called him. By all accounts he was a pleasant fellow.

Unintended consequences: a few years after Jaguar was taken over by Ford (c.1990), their dealers were reporting reduced profits despite increased sales. Why? The more reliable newer cars spent less time in the (previously) very profitable service department.
Good luck with the novels, Mike; for 2017 I will recommend anything by Alan Furst; 'The Polish Officer' is perhaps my favorite of his that I've read.

Since nobody else has named the economic phenomenon, here is its actual title: rent-seeking. The definition--

Rent-seeking is the use of the resources of a company, an organization or an individual to obtain economic gain from others without reciprocating any benefits to society through wealth creation. An example of rent-seeking is when a company lobbies the government for loan subsidies, grants or tariff protection.

It's generally considered to be a bad thing.

I'm a bit croggled at the $588/year appliance service contract, though I can understand the impulse behind it. Last week I saw a Samsung fridge with a $3600 price tag, which is more than I spent on my fridge, range, washer, dryer, dishwasher, hood, and chest freezer combined.

[It's just another example of the process that's been underway for several decades--in America since Reagan was elected in 1980--of the bifurcation of Western societies into two separate economies. There is way too much capital "sloshing around the world" in Niall Ferguson's phrase, and it is concentrated in far too few hands. We in the West are becoming two-tier societies, with approximately 10% of the population controlling most of the wealth and another 20% sympathizing with them, either partaking partially in the greedfest or aspiring to, and the lower 50-70% living to increasing degrees in partial to extreme economic deprivation. Egypt is an extreme example of this kind of have/have-not economy (and why any modern democracy would want to emulate Egypt in this regard is beyond mysterious). Things like million-dollar automobiles and $47,300 kitchen stoves (really, Google "La Cornue Grand Palais") are simply a natural market response to the situation--made for, and marketed to, the entitled 10% who are simply not price-sensitive to such paltry amounts.

Expect this trend to continue. There's nothing that can be done. --Mike]

What an ironic coincidence that I read about your appliance troubles right as T.O.P. returned from the grave – it was very 404 this morning as I opened it, just like everyday, as first order of business.

Mike,
Thanks for another year of TOP, and wishing that 2017 will be a wonderful year for you (and everyone else)

Just a thought re Appliances:
If 'water' related appliances are failing could it be hard water ?
If it is the electronics that are failing could power surges be to blame?
We had that problem at our vacation home. A whole house surge protector solved it in that case.

I certainly don't want to defend the maker of Mike's washer. Certainly, it is a durable good and expected life should be 10-15+ years under typical use. I doubt very much the manufacturer is designing it to fail right after warranty expiration.

Since I work specifically on quality projects for a (non-consumer) manufacturing company, here are some different thoughts.

As many of you bemoan the "good old days" of manufacturing, keep in mind your sample sizes are anecdotal - the fact that two 1970s Maytags mentioned in this thread are still running says *nothing* about 1970s Maytags in general vs modern appliances. (Though in their day, the statistical evidence is pretty solid that Maytags were better than their peers - not true at all today, btw).

Also, consider the design constraints - a modern appliance must (often, by law sometimes, other times to match competitive forces) use much less energy and water than its predecessor of 20 years ago and meet new safety standards . It usually must also meet ever changing ROHS standards (Reduction of Hazardous Substances). Lead solder is awesome at holding parts in place for a lifetime - but not so awesome when it is time to dispose of the product ...

All of these forces are in motion along with enormous corporate cost-cutting - because customers messages about sticker price and shareholders messages about share price are heard much more clearly than customers complaints about quality. So companies often listen to the wrong voices, until it kills them (see Studebaker, many others since).

Extended warranties are almost always a terrible product to buy. Self insure all these things (cars, appliances, cameras, etc) by setting some money aside in a pooled savings each time you buy a new item. Over a 50+ year consuming lifetime, you'll save a lot. Use the excess to buy more cameras and lenses. :-)

Unless you *know* your use is well outside typical norms (i.e., you've got a family of 8 using that washer, or it is used for towels at a dog grooming facility) you are getting ripped off with the extended warranty because in addition to the high margin on that item, *you* are subsidizing the dog groomer and the family of 8.

Consumer Reports has enormous statistical reliability data (with a self-reporting bias, but still) about a lot of these items. There are substantial differences among brands, you can stack the deck a little in your favor.

Even so, variance is a powerful force and it reserves the right to move against you at any time, for any reason.

Wishing you all tens of millions of hours of MTBF (mean time between failure) for all of your products in the new year.

"It's almost as if business in general is morphing quietly into an art of gentle, legal extortion. I almost hesitate to mention this, for fear of creating a jinx, but I really hope camera manufacturers aren't sitting around large tables this very minute plotting ways to extract more cash from us with manipulative schemes involving planned obsolescence, extended warranties, service plans, and monthly service fees."

...has really hit home, and it even relates to photography, because there IS plotting going on, and it's happening "right here in River City."

I am referring to Adobe's recent adoption of their rental scheme with Photoshop. I am still using PS6, the last version one could buy outright, but with my next camera, PS6 will no longer be able to process its RAW files, and I'll be forced to either become in thrall to Adobe' rental scheme, or abandon Photoshop.

The latter is just what I've decided to do; I've bought a copy of the new Affinity Photo, which is as full featured as PS, but is ONLY available to buy (for $50, or less if it's currently on sale). It's definitely NOT available by subscription.

This seems to me a perfect example of a scheme of planned obsolescence by Adobe "to extract more cash from us," and I refuse to knuckle under and become an indentured servant of this company.

This is where capitalism fails because it is not transparent. Short term thinking putting profit above all else is enabled because the costs are shifted to the planet and future generations - wasteful use of resources, pollution, etc. All the while the powerful lobbies buy politicians to keep it going.

You'd think 2016 would be the year people finally woke up to this, but whether through a sense of being powerless, or more likely stupidity, 2016 is going to be remembered for all the wrong reasons.

We have a history of building things that last forever. My grandmother's Maytag washer out-lived her. This was the washer that you filled twice per load with a hose, once to wash and again to rinse before running the clothes through the wringer that sometimes caught the unwary operator's fingers. It was replaced by a less robust but labor saving and safer Maytag.

I thought the name was familiar: Anthony Heald had a key role in the movie Silence of the Lambs (as Hannibal Lecter's smug jailor) and a regular role on the TV series "Boston Public", among many, many other media and theater roles. You're in good hands.

I envy anyone reading Moby-Dick for the first time. It's a tremendous, grand experiment and magnificent achievement. If you ever find that its copious energies aren't propelling you onward, check out E.M. Forester' brief appreciation in his Aspects of the Novel (his pithy primer on the novel, it's various shapes and how to approach them). D.H. Lawrence gave his own homage in his Studies in Classic American Literature (though it's possible that he never read the ending). Just two of many great writers who were gobsmacked by that great book.

Bon voyage, and Happy New Year!

(That "Big Read" sounds great, Jarle! And not at all corny considering how the book is written.)

In the decade to come, one of the great changes for automobile enthusiasts will be the much reduced life of used cars built after about 2005 or so. This is because of the huge increase in the use of electronics in vital functioning parts of the car, and the fact that most electronics are neither stocked nor replaceable after 5-10 years. This will be especially noticeable to people who wish to replace their LCD displays in cars after 10 years, about the maximum life of an LCD display.

Our current crop of cars will never make it to vintage status, unlike that Rolls Royce that Mike mentions.

I've long listened to audio books and when you get a great reader, as you usually do, it can be wonderful. (Sir) Tony Robinson, Stephen Fry, etc. I once tried looking for free-to-download audio books and found a source from which I tried Jules Verne's 20,000 leagues under the sea. Turned out to be read by amateurs, with a different reader for each chapter. I've now gratefully returned to paying for my audio books and being thankful for the quality I pay for.
Anthony

Speaking of obsolescence (planned or simply due to lack of proper design, testing and manufacturing,) that is one reason I will never, unless absolutely forced, do away with manual, mechanical cameras. I'm even using light meters even less in an attempt to be less dependent.

But I don't think camera manufacturers will be sloppy about longevity. The difference is that the major producers sell to professionals who absolutely depend on the reliability of their gear. And yes, they can often write off the expense of new gear if something fails prematurely, but often don't want to for various reasons. And those situations leave a bad taste in a the mouth of a professional - word gets around pretty fast and the amateurs and "prosumers" pay a lot of attention to that.

Very few people depend on a washing machine for their livelihood, and those who do are either laundromats who buy a different line of machines through a different channel, or are the repairmen and retailers who actually benefit from unreliability.

The bottom line may be to buy an old wringer washer, have it brought up to snuff by a local, highly skilled repairman, and just deal with the vagaries of driers.